The Forgotten Field - Chapter 236

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————

Chapter 236
He fixed the taciturn Guard with a sharp, piercing stare.
“I asked what happened.”
“Oh, brother….”
At that moment, a rough voice laden with the clang of metal struck his ears.
Barcas turned his head sharply and froze as he spotted Raina sitting collapsed on the ground, her form caked in dust and debris.
“What are you doing in a place like this?”
“I, that is….”
His sister, her face drained of color, trembled as she lowered her head, unable to find her words.
As he reached to seize his sister’s shoulder with one hand and press her for answers, a woman who had been kneeling and wailing before a pile of rubble suddenly lifted her head and rushed toward him.
“Grand Duke, Your Excellency!”
Barcas gazed down at the woman’s face with eyes as cold as ice—a visage he had grown weary of seeing since his boyhood.
The woman, her dwarven features crudely distorted by anguish, clawed desperately at his blood-soaked garments and cried out in anguish.
“Please help us! Our young lady is trapped inside!”
In that instant, a sharp ringing pierced through his mind.
He felt his vision narrow dramatically as he stared at the mountain of building debris.
The woman’s anguished sobs echoed through his ears as though muffled beneath water.
“Please, Your Excellency, save our young lady! I beg you!”
He shoved the woman aside roughly and approached the towering heap of stone.
As if the building’s outer wall had been torn away entirely, layers of interlocking masonry blocked the structure’s lower section, beneath which lay the shattered remains of a staircase that appeared to have fallen from the very top of the Castle Tower.
He immediately bent down and lifted the massive stone slab blocking the building’s entrance.
He felt his shoulder and arm muscles convulsing with strain, yet he paid no heed, shoving the debris aside and frantically clearing away collapsed pillars and rubble.
The Guards who had approached his side assisted by sweeping away smaller fragments. Yet Barcas could scarcely register their presence.
It was as though all sensation had been numbed.
Light, sound, even the passage of time itself seemed frozen—he could feel nothing.
How long did he continue, half-conscious, repeating the same motions of clearing stone after stone? Someone seized his shoulder.
“Your Excellency… blood continues to flow from your shoulder. Perhaps you should first tend to your wounds….”
He roughly brushed away the obstructing hand and bent over the Castle Tower’s remains once more. As he grasped the base of a massive fallen pillar and lifted it with a sharp motion, something pale caught his eye.
Barcas froze, staring down at the pallid face of a woman half-buried beneath the rubble.
Suddenly, as though his thoughts had been severed, his mind went dark.
Soldiers stepped past him, standing motionless and dazed, and hurriedly cleared the debris from her body. They carefully dragged her limp form outside.
Only then did Barcas drop the pillar he had been holding and stumble toward her side.
A Soldier knelt on both knees beside her, examining her condition, and muttered in a sorrowful voice.
“…She is not breathing.”
A mournful sigh rippled through the crowd that had gathered around the Castle Tower.
The man added in a trembling voice.
“She has already… passed away.”
The woman who had been wailing on the ground suddenly embraced her body and began to cry out even more loudly.
Raina, standing in a daze, began to weep as well. It felt like watching some grotesque and surreal play unfold.
He stood motionless, gazing down at her pale face in silence. As he did, his vision began to warp in an increasingly strange manner. It was as though the entire world had shattered into fragments.
In an instant, ash-gray pallor consumed the world, and pitch-black darkness descended upon it.
As if the sun’s light had been extinguished, I contemplated from within that fathomless abyss.
Dawn would never break again.
Light would never, ever grace my world again.
* * *
The Grand Duchess’s funeral was held over four days.
As an endless stream of mourners paid their respects, the Grand Cathedral echoed with soft funeral hymns, and flowers donated by the citizens of Kalmor accumulated in thick layers upon the wooden casket.
All of them appeared to grieve the Grand Duchess’s death with genuine sorrow.
The women who had lived alongside the Grand Duchess in Laedgo Castle during the three-week siege bore tears in their eyes, and the Handmaidens who had served her most closely clung to one another in anguished weeping.
The Guards too made no effort to conceal their grief. They seemed firmly convinced that the Grand Duchess had saved Kalmor. Most of them had witnessed firsthand the sudden appearance of the Wolf Beast pack blocking the enemy’s advance. The consensus among the Kalmor Security Guard Force was that without the wolves appearing at each critical moment to impede the enemy, the city’s security forces alone could never have held out until reinforcements arrived.
Rumors even circulated that the Grand Duchess might truly have been the incarnation of Tiramere, the spirit of the earth. Such reverent mourning spread rapidly throughout the entire city. For the duration of the funeral, every tavern and market in Kalmor remained shuttered, and black flags hung throughout the city streets.
Yet even as the entire city lay shrouded in grief, the Grand Duke shed not a single tear. He merely stood before the Altar like a specter, his face drained of all color. He appeared to be a hollow shell of a man.
The Grand Duke, who had maintained his vigil with the stillness of a stone statue until the funeral’s final day, returned immediately to his duties the moment his wife’s casket was interred in the Chapel behind Laedgo Castle. He then began directing the city’s reconstruction as though nothing had transpired.
Within weeks, Kalmor gradually regained its vitality. Hundreds of stonemasons from throughout the Eastern Territories set to work rebuilding the collapsed City Walls, Guard posts, Watchtowers, and Castle Towers, while the sound of carpenters’ hammers echoed as they constructed new Cottages in the outlying Villages that had become Ruins.
Even the Fields once covered in blood and corpses were now quietly erasing the traces of war as sparse weeds and wildflowers bloomed profusely across them.
Yet unlike Kalmor, which gradually regained its vitality, a somber atmosphere still lingered within Laedgo Castle.
Edrick Lubon, stepping into the eerily silent Hall, spotted the dark-faced Head Handmaiden and spoke to her carefully.
“I have come to meet with the Grand Duke. Is he in his Office at present?”
“Yes, His Grace is attending to his duties on the third floor.”
The Handmaiden offered a curt reply, then bowed briefly before disappearing into the kitchen. Scratching the back of his head, he turned and ascended the Staircase.
As he passed through the dark Corridor, the two Guards stationed on either side of the door recognized him and immediately stepped aside. Edrick took a moment to steady his breathing before knocking on the door.
“It is Rubon. Might you spare me a moment?”
“…Come in.”
With permission granted, the Guard quickly opened the door. As Edrick stepped inside, he involuntarily halted upon seeing Barcas seated behind the desk, absorbed in reviewing ledgers.
At first glance, he appeared no different from usual. Yet Edrick had long since noticed that he was growing visibly gaunt with each passing day.
His face, noticeably thinner over the mere weeks that had elapsed, seemed to have grown sharper still, and the collarbones visible between his collar were more deeply etched than before.
It felt as though I were facing a blade honed to its absolute limit.

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————